Damsel in De-Stress

It was a bad day for Merlin... seriously, a bad day. He had been running around the entire twenty-four hours previous, hunting with Arthur, running errands for Gaius, and, of course, he was entrusted the lovely chore of scrubbing Gaius's leech tank.

So there he was, muscles sore, hands slimly, overtly paranoid about Morgana, and drenched from when had run into a servant who was in the process of scrubbing the floors. Sometimes, he thought, the dirty water buckets loved his head too much. He absently rubbed his elbow where Arthur had recently hit him with a flying wine goblet.

He wandered into the woods just outside the castle, nobody would be looking for him here. He desperately needed a rest.

"Gaius." The physician turned at the sound of his name being called out. Lancelot was walking down the hall toward him. "Have you seen Merlin?"

The wizend old scholar shook his head. "No, I think he may be with Arthur."

Lancelot shook his head. "I've just left Arthur. I can't find Merlin."

"Well, this is indeed worriesome." Gaius mused grimly. "Let us look for him."

Lancelot nodded gratefully. "I'll check the lower streets, send word if you've found him."

The two men sneaking silently through the woods were spies, infiltrators, hoping to find weakness in Camelot's defenses for Kind Cenred. They had heard rumors of an unused and widely unknown escape tunnel that was once used by sorcerers and witches to escape Camelot's stone walls. Perhaps, Cenred's men could infiltrate Camelot through his route and attack from the inside?

"According to the ancient map, the tunnel's entrance would be right around... there." One of the scruffy men pointed.

"Wait, someone's here." his companion hissed in hushed whisper as he drew his friend back with a restraining hand on the man's sleeve.

Merlin blinked, looking around. He thought he was being watched. Then he shrugged his shoulders, maybe it was just his wild imagination...

Just as he lowered his defenses, the two ruffians pounced on him, restraining him and clamping a gloved hand over his mouth to keep him from shouting. "What should we do with him?" One of the men asked.

"Kill him, nobody can know we were here." His friend responded, unsheathing a rusty dagger.

Merlin's eyes widened and he let out a muffled 'Mmmphh!'

"Don't worry, it'll be quick and painless." The man with the dagger sneered, moving to slice Merlin's throat.

It was all too much. Merlin squeezed his eyes shut, gathering all his energy toward himself before his eyes snapped open, irises glinting gold. There was a powerful gust of wind, or, it felt something like that, and his two opponents were thrown forcefully back.

"Argh! Seriously! I leave the castle to get away from trouble and then this! Oh, just my luck!" Merlin expelled in frustration. "Wonderful."

With a few murmured words, he had the two men strung up in the tree branches with vines. "How kind." he smiled cheerfully, rubbing his knuckes in mock-anticipation. "Punching bags, that's just what I need right now."

The two men gulped.

"And here I was, just about to leap to your rescue with some obscure joke about you always being a damsel in distress..." Lancelot chuckled, making his way toward Merlin. "... Looks like my services wern't needed."

Merlin chuckled sheepishly and released the two men. "Ahem, some of Cenred's spies come to infiltrate Camelot."

Lancelot nodded, eyebrow raised amusedly. "I'll be sure they are punished accordingly."

"Yeah..." Merlin scampered a short distance away, then he stopped, turning back. "Um, I was never here, okay?"

Lancelot smiled knowingly and nodded. "Sure, but Arthur is looking for you, has been for the last few hours, in fact. You might want to, you know, run."

Merlin's eyes fell closed heavily and he groaned. "Of all the stupid, pompus, supercilious..." Everything after that faded out as Merlin stumbled back in the direction of the castle.

Lancelot just shook his head and laughed.

The End